


i'd be the voice that drove orpheus

by lazyfish



Series: promptober [5]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Greek Mythology, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Ambiguous/Open Ending, F/M, Fitz is Eurydice, Jemma is Orpheus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-11-22 23:50:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20882714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazyfish/pseuds/lazyfish
Summary: Jemma has been blessed with the gift of music - but is it enough to save the one she loves?





	i'd be the voice that drove orpheus

Here’s how it starts: she’s the daughter of a muse.

Here’s how it starts: she’s the daughter of a king.

Here’s how it starts: she’s the daughter of a god.

Here’s how it starts:  _ she doesn’t remember how it starts. _

It’s a blur, a wash of color. None of it is true, all of it is true, and does the truth of the past matter more than the truth of the present?

No matter where she’s come from, no matter where she’s going, she’s always had music. A lyre, pan pipes, her voice - anything that can be an instrument, she makes music with. Jemma loves music more than anything. She loves how it makes sense. People think it’s all emotion, but there’s a logic to it, too. There’s a pattern to how the notes swoop and sway and how it makes people play, and it’s a science she’s still eons from understanding, but teasing the mystery apart wouldn’t be fun if it was easy.

(She doesn't know if there is a science to how she can make animals and rocks and the wind dance, too, but Jemma’s scared to ask questions. The gods don’t take kindly to the ones who ask questions, she’s learned. Humans are their playthings, meant to be complacent and entertaining. She is brilliant, but at the end of the day, she is still just a mortal.)

She loves music more than anything, until she loves Fitz.

He has curly hair and blue eyes and a love for knowledge rivaling her own. He’s smarter than anyone she’s ever met before, but that’s not why she loves him.

She loves him because he dances like a wildman when she sings, she loves him because he can’t hold a tune, she loves him because he has so much  _ joy _ despite having so many reasons to sorrow.

Jemma loves him, so she marries him. She sings them both to sleep on the night of their wedding and he laughs like starlight and there is not a moment she regrets falling in love with her unfathomable man.

There is not a moment she regrets him, even when he is ripped from her too soon. 

There is no music the day he’s bitten.

There is no music the day he dies.

(There is no light the day he’s bitten.

There is no light the day he dies.)

She doesn’t know what to do except to beg to an uncaring god. She travels down, down, down, to where there is no light and no hope and no warmth and no music. The land of the dead isn’t someplace Jemma ever expected to visit, but her journeys have taken her many places; what’s one more, for the one she loves?

She plays a swan song to the ferryman when he rows her down the river; he doesn’t seem to realize she’s still got life in her. The dog realizes she’s still breathing, but she plays her song louder and soon it doesn’t care, either. Music is foreign to them but they know it’s beautiful, too. 

She’s never really appreciated her gift until the moment she steps onto the banks of the Styx, the castle of the king of the Underworld in sight. It is her music that has brought her safely so far. She only prays her music will lead her home - will lead them both home.

The spirits grab and claw at her, but she sings to them and for the first time since their dying, they find peace. The wind howls above her, trying to drown her out, but she sings louder. Her throat scratches and her feet ache and she is certain she will never make it, until the moment she’s at Hades’s door.

She knocks.

He lets her in, amused with the mortal woman who has come so far all alone.

(She is not alone - she has her pan pipes and they are more than enough company.)

She plays him a song, she weeps for her husband, and then, on her knees, she begs the god of the dead for a life.

And he grants it.

There is one thing she has to do. Only one.

_ You must have faith, little one. _ (Jemma has never enjoyed being called little, but she can’t fixate on that detail now. She is so close she can taste it.)  _ Lead him to where you came. He will follow the music. Kiss him, and he will live. _

She can do that. Fitz has always known where to find her, has always known where to follow her. Jemma doesn’t even know the music is necessary, because if Fitz is out there, he will find her. But she nods, because she thinks that is all she must do. But no, those aren’t Hades’s terms, just his instructions. His terms come next.

_ Don’t look back _ .

Don’t look back? That’s what he’d meant by having faith. She has to believe Fitz will follow her. She has to believe Fitz  _ wants _ to follow her. She has to believe the god of the dead will keep up his end of the bargain, she has to believe so  _ many _ things.

Faith has never been Jemma’s forte. Her first love is Fitz; her second love is music; her third love is logic. Faith and logic seem so opposite - believing in what you can’t see, or believing what you can see and prove.

She swallows hard. For him, she will have faith.

She nods.

Hades tells her the way, and Jemma memorizes every word he says. Even through the gauzy veil of grief, her brain can hold onto most anything. This is important enough to hold onto. 

She leaves the palace, her pipes already to her lips.

She begins to play the song she sang to him on their wedding night, walking through the fields with long, steady strides.

She moves closer and closer to the light, hiking up hills and hoping beyond all hope he is behind her.

She won’t look back.

She won’t look back.

She won’t look -


End file.
